I’ve been playing around generating random numbers from compressed spam and other random events just to see if I can do it. Every now and then I see stuff on the web having to do with generating cryptographic keys and things being hackable because there isn’t enough entropy to generate good random data.

So after playing with it I can generate a lot of good random data fast and I was thinking of making a random data server that anyone could access that would provide a chunk of random data to seed or mix in to the data pool you are using.

Maybe I have a solution where there is no problem, but I was wondering if there was any value in providing – maybe selling – random data?

If it is possible to generate predictable data from seemingly chaotic numbers, such as what is done with the Mandelbrot set, then what makes you think ANYTHING is truly random or, for that matter, secure? (I mean, haven’t you heard about the NSA, Mister Anderson?)

If you want to generate truly random numbers, try driving around any city in America during rush hour making sure you don’t go over the speed limit and count the times someone flips you the bird. Then divide that number by the number of crazy people you see between exits and multiply by pi.

“”…Then, one day, a student who had been left to sweep up after a particularly unsuccessful party found himself reasoning in this way: If, he thought to himself, such a machine is a virtual impossibility, it must have finite improbability. So all I have to do in order to make one is to work out how exactly improbable it is, feed that figure into the finite improbability generator, give it a fresh cup of really hot tea… and turn it on! …

“”… He was even more startled when just after he was awarded the Galactic Institute’s Prize for Extreme Cleverness he was lynched by a rampaging mob of respectable physicists who had realized that one thing they couldn’t stand was a smart-arse.

“”So, the US Secret Service has issued a requirement for software that can detect sarcasm in tweets…

“”Well now, here’s the thing: automating sarcasm detection is easy. It’s so easy they teach it in first year computer science courses; it’s an obvious application of AI. (You just get your Turing-test-passing AI that understands all the shared assumptions and social conventions that human-human conversation rely on to identify those statements that explicitly contradict beliefs that the conversationalist implicitly holds. So if I say “it’s easy to earn a living as a novelist” and the AI knows that most novelists don’t believe this and that I am a member of the set of all novelists, the AI can infer that I am being sarcastic. Or I’m an outlier. Or I’m trying to impress a date. Or I’m secretly plotting to assassinate the POTUS.)

“”I predict that everybody will start deploying sarcasm as a standard conversational gambit on the internet. Trolling the secret service will become a competitive sport, the goal being to not receive a visit from the SS in response to your totally serious threat to kill the resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Al Qaida terrrrst training camps will hold tutorials on metonymy, aggressive irony, cynical detachment, and sarcasm as a camouflage tactic for suicide bombers. Post-modernist pranks will draw down the full might of law enforcement by mistake, while actual death threats go encoded as LOLCat macros. Any attempt to algorithmically detect sarcasm will fail because sarcasm is self-referential and the awareness that a sarcasm detector may be in use will change the intent behind the message.

Marc, you should sell your RNG to those guys. They can use it to punish {negative reinforcement} the AI every time it accidentally gets John Oliver droned. — “”Now, go to your 386 and run Perkels’ Pet until the sequence starts to repeat…

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